A Creepy Catch of The Day

The snakehead fish, a voracious Asian invader that's been known to breathe out of water and scoot short distances over land, has reappeared in Maryland, state authorities announced yesterday.

A 19-inch northern snakehead was caught Monday at a lake in Wheaton Regional Park -- the first appearance of the toothy green fish in the area since 2002, when the state of Maryland had to poison a pond in Crofton to prevent snakeheads there from wiggling away.

Unlike the Crofton snakeheads, the newly caught fish was not in an isolated fishing hole. Pine Lake drains into the Northwest Branch, which goes to the Anacostia River and the Potomac River.

Yesterday, authorities tried to play down the possibility that the predatory fish had spread, saying they used electric shocks and large nets to gather fish from the surrounding waters and had found no other snakeheads.

Still, to be sure, they said they will drain the five-acre lake beginning today.

"I'll be confident when the pond is drained," said Steve Early of the Maryland Department of Natural Resources.

The northern snakehead is native to China and Korea and is prized as a food in several Asian countries. It is imported to the United States for sale in some fish markets and as an aquarium fish.

If it is released in a pond or lake in this area, experts say, the snakehead is instantly at the top of the food chain: It can grow as large as 47 inches long and weigh 15 pounds. The fish can clean out a pond of native fish, officials said, and it also eats insects -- probably including this year's expected bumper crop of cicadas.

The snakehead caught Monday appears to be about 4 years old -- old enough to reproduce, though it is still too early in the year for breeding, Early said yesterday. Because the fish had not been dissected, authorities were not sure of its sex.

The draining of the lake, which is no deeper than eight feet, will begin this afternoon and probably be completed tomorrow morning, authorities said. They said native fish will first be captured and then reintroduced to the lake when it fills again with water.

Early said that authorities would continue to look for snakeheads in other bodies of water, including downstream. But he said that with a food-laden environment such as Pine Lake, a snakehead would be unlikely to leave.